by Tiffany Tsao
The dark patches on her body, her face. The raised welts on her palms. The vomiting. You had months to put two and two together and come up with four. Months.
But she had said not to worry, and he had trusted her. Was that so wrong? Weren’t you supposed to trust those you loved? Wasn’t that how people showed love?
Then, out of nowhere, a merciless barrage of newsprint:
“Wife Poisoned Herself,” Claims Publisher
Henry Wimpledown, founder and managing editor of Murder Ink, a small press specializing in crime fiction, claimed he knew nothing about the arsenic that police found in his bathroom cupboard . . .
Murder, He Wrote? Investigation of Wimpledown Continues
“How can you watch someone you love die and not notice? It’s too bloody suspicious, if you ask me,” said Wimpledown’s neighbour . . .
Murder Publisher Walks Free Despite Public Outcry
“Of course he killed her. And it’s a disgrace that they’ve set him loose. They should at least take the boy away from him. The child’s not safe with that sicko.”
God, Cassie, why’d you do it? Didn’t you think of the consequences?
The blue lips sighed. “Yes, you’re right, Henry. It’s never your fault, is it, Henry?”
He gave his head a vigorous shake. Get a hold of yourself, man. That’s all in the past. It’s a new life now for you and the boy. It took a year for Garamond to trust you again. To eat or drink anything you gave him without trembling and crying. But he did trust you again. And you’ve made a new life for yourselves, haven’t you? No more bricks through the window. No more name-calling in the street. No more graffiti on the front door. No more death threats over the phone.
It was the tap on his shoulder that brought him to his senses, followed by the usual routine: Garamond carrying the stools back to the shed, Henry taking charge of the full buckets. They started back together by the sinister light of a glowering sun sinking into the horizon, setting everything awash in a wine-dark sea. In the distance, Henry could make out the blaze of the bonfire on the Arms’ lawn, and the silhouettes of tiny people setting up silhouettes of tiny stalls for the market being held that night.
The sight of the Arms reminded Henry of the Questians who were lodging there—not just the One and Mildred, but also the incongruous pair who had shown up today to replace them. His brow furrowed. On the one hand, he was grateful to the Quest—for the crumpled leaflet handed to him on the street so many years ago, for teaching him and the boy how to transfer, for guiding them to the Compendium and the major settlement in Bolivia-Aspersion so they could get supplies and figure out what to do next.
On the other hand, he was angry. Yes, the Quest helped those seeking to settle in the More Known World, but they did so grudgingly. It wasn’t a priority, they always reminded settlers. The main aim of the Quest was to chart the unknown, not help people move, even though with the help of the Oddfit Questians especially, settlement would be so much easier. Just imagine how many useful things an Oddfit could transfer from one Territory to another by making several trips in the course of a single day—supplies, tools, even heavy machinery if disassembled and moved in stages. It was possible to transfer only one’s self and as much inanimate matter as one could carry—that law of physics applied to both Oddfits and Sumfits alike. But an Oddfit could make as many transfers, back to back, as needed until the job was done.
The One knew this. She could easily dispatch the Oddfits in her employ to assist settlers. She was often approached with such requests whenever she visited the settlements—pleas to help transfer a large generator, a tractor, and the like. But the woman was obdurate, cutting short every request with the same words: “Settlement is a side effect, not an aim.”
Side effect—more like an afterthought, grumbled Henry in his heart. And who could blame an afterthought for being resentful about where it stood in the universe?
Suddenly something—or rather, nothing—jolted him out of his thoughts. Not a noise, strictly speaking, but the exact opposite.
“Don’t do that,” Henry scolded Garamond, regretting his gruffness almost immediately.
“Sorry,” the boy mumbled. “I can help. With the buckets.” The way he spoke suggested he wasn’t used to speaking. Nobody was in Flee Town.
Henry lowered one bucket to the ground and ruffled his son’s hair. “In a year or two. When you’re stronger than I am.”
It was getting hard to see anything now, but Henry caught the grin that broke across Garamond’s face and felt his heart grow warm. He picked up the bucket again, and father and son walked the last stretch together, side by side.
CHAPTER 6
Ann peered through the window at the hustle and bustle below. The bonfire was in full roar, and from the looks of things, all of Flee Town had shown up for the fortnightly affair. It made sense that they would—market night was the closest thing to a special occasion that ever went on in Cambodia-Abscond.
“It’s getting lively,” she remarked.
The One, at whom this comment was directed, said nothing. She was busy stoking another fire, which she probably would have made as large as the one outside if not for the limitations of the fireplace in her room. The One considered any temperature below subtropical to be frigid, and though she could tolerate the cold as well as she could tolerate heat and hunger and pain and the inferior intelligence of all those around her, as far as she could help it, she didn’t. Worse, her tolerance had deteriorated along with her health. Where a cloak or a shawl might have once sufficed—especially in what should have been a warm room—such meagre defences against the cold were useless now, and Ann could barely make out the human being inside the bulky ball of knits, fleece, and fur standing directly in front of the fireplace. One might not even have been able to ascertain whether there was someone beneath the clothes at all, if it weren’t for occasional glimpses of two wire-thin brown wrists furiously working the bellows.
Ann’s first instinct was to repeat her comment in a louder voice, but upon second thought, she decided it was hardly worth saying twice, and went instead for the jugular of the matter at hand.
“Do I have to?”
“Of course you do,” the One answered promptly from the depths of her winter wear. “You’re the logical candidate.”
“There’s hardly any evidence to go on,” Ann protested.
The One set the bellows aside and began warming her mittened hands. “That’s not true,” she stated calmly. “The circumstances surrounding Nimali’s death have shed new light on the situation.”
“You mean the ‘Flee Town’ written on her hand?”
The One shrugged. “That’s interesting too. But I was thinking more about how the body was transferred from Jamaica-Fallacy.”
Ann picked up the thread her former mentor had teased from its spool and began to think out loud. “We’ve always suspected that the murderer has access to information only available to members of the Quest; how else would he or she know about such relatively new Territories, or that the victims would even be there? But transferring a human body . . . only an Oddfit would be capable of that.”
The One nodded approvingly. She had long arrived at the same conclusion.
“So we know it’s an Oddfit, most likely a Questian,” Ann continued. “But why handle Nimali differently? Why bring the body to Flee Town? And why write the destination on her hand?”
“Why indeed?” said the One as she picked up the bellows again. “I certainly hope you find some answers.”
Ann sighed. “So it really does have to be me? There’s no one else you trust?” asked Ann.
“It depends what you mean by ‘trust,’” said the One. “For example, I believe wholeheartedly that the Other isn’t the killer. And I believe wholeheartedly that, say, Murgatroyd isn’t either. In that sense of the word, I ‘trust’ them completely. But whether I trust them or anyone besides you to track down a dangerous serial killer without getting themselves murdered in the process . . .�
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Ann nodded in grudging acknowledgement. “Has Nimali’s death affected things? More than the first two deaths, I mean?”
“I’ve already received fifteen requests from Oddfit Questians for reassignment to cataloguing. Five of them said that they’d even be willing to do dissemination if it meant they didn’t have to explore.”
“That bad, huh?” said Ann.
“And those are only the Questians who’ve had the nerve to say anything directly to me at all. I suspect we’ll see a significant drop in everyone’s exploration activity until the killer is found, if the killer is found. Nimali’s death has been a definite tipping point.”
The One pointed to a cloth-wrapped bundle on the wooden table next to the bed.
“Files. For the victims. Who knows? Perhaps you’ll discover some clues.”
“Have you?” asked Ann.
The One shook her head.
“Then what chance do I have?”
The older woman shrugged. “It’s worth a try. If anyone besides myself could, it would be you.”
Ann raised an eyebrow. “Is that a compliment? You’re getting soft in your old age.”
“Too soft,” the One replied sardonically. “I’m practically caving in.” No sooner had the One uttered this did her shoulders convulse. Ann saw the black handkerchief appear, whisk something away from her former mentor’s lips, and vanish again into the folds of her clothes.
“What about Murgatroyd?” the One asked hastily, as if to divert Ann’s attention from what she had just seen.
“What about him?”
“Is he coming with you? This is a dangerous mission. And as you know, Murgatroyd isn’t . . . competent.”
Something about how the One said this made Ann flinch.
“I can look after him,” she said.
“He’ll be one more thing for you to worry about,” said the One. “Perhaps we should keep him out of harm’s way—put his training on hiatus.” The One reflected further. “Maybe now would be a good time to reassign him.”
Ann’s back straightened. “‘Reassign him’?”
“Yes. To cataloguing. Or dissemination. Take him off exploration altogether. It’s obviously not his strong suit.” The One spoke offhandedly, as if she were speaking about moving a vase or a chair.
“He just needs more time,” Ann protested.
“That’s the problem. By rights, he should have mastered the transferring skills required for exploration by now. Has he?”
Ann paused for a long time before she answered. “No.”
“That’s what I thought.”
“But he will.”
“How can you be sure?”
Ann hesitated. “I can’t point to anything concrete,” she said finally. “But remember when we first recruited him? How amazed we were that he’d retained so much oddfittingness after twenty-five years in the Known World? ‘Odd, even for an Oddfit.’ That’s what you said.”
“And I’ll say it again. ‘Odd, even for an Oddfit.’ Any other Oddfit would have graduated from the apprentice stage by now. I thought his resilient oddfittingness indicated exceptional abilities. Obviously, I was wrong.”
“I think we should give him more time,” Ann insisted.
“I think you’re being sentimental,” countered the One. “You used to be one of our top explorers. Since Murgatroyd’s become your apprentice, the amount of meaningful exploring you’ve done has practically come to a standstill. He’s holding you back.”
“I don’t mind,” said Ann.
“And slowing down the whole Quest,” the One continued. “Our mission is to make the More Known World more known. To broaden horizons. To expand the outer limits of knowledge. We can’t afford inefficiency. Especially not now.”
Minutes seemed to pass before Ann broke the silence. “Well, there’s no point in trying to decide Murgatroyd’s situation at present. There won’t be any exploring of mine for him to slow down if I’m going hunting for a serial killer.”
“And you’re sure you want him to go on this hunt?”
Ann sighed impatiently. She always felt herself reverting into immaturity when she was around her former mentor—as if she were still the same ten-year-old girl the One had rescued from the Known World so long ago. “Yes, I am,” she huffed. “And I’ll have you know, I’m not being completely irrational. As you yourself implied earlier, I have certain . . . abilities. Murgatroyd will be safest with me.”
The One shrugged. “All right. If he’s all right with it. You might want to ask him, you know.”
“Well, you might want to ask him how he feels about being reassigned,” Ann shot back.
The One sighed. “Four weeks. If you don’t think you’re making any progress by then, you can resume exploration activities. And we’ll discuss Murgatroyd then.”
Ann nodded.
There was a knock on the door.
“Come in!” the One called.
The door opened a crack and Mildred peered in. “Better not,” she replied when she saw that Ann was still there. “Just wanted to tell you I’m all packed. Let me know when you’re ready to leave. I’ll be downstairs.”
The door shut. The One turned to Ann, brow furrowed.
“That reminds me,” she said. “What on earth is going on between you and Mildred? You’ve only just met.”
Ann shrugged.
“Don’t be childish.”
Involuntarily, not to mention childishly, Ann scowled.
“What’s wrong?” the One pressed.
“You’re trusting her with an awful lot, that’s all,” blurted Ann. “Especially for a new recruit. You’re giving her access to all kinds of information. You’re letting her follow you around all the time. How do you know she can be trusted?”
The One raised her eyebrows. “I’m not trusting her with any more information than what is already available to everyone on the Quest.” Then she chuckled. “And as for letting her follow me around—if you’re worried that she’s the killer, then perhaps I really should give this assignment to somebody else.”
“It’s not that,” muttered Ann.
“Then what is it?”
Ann sighed. “I don’t know.”
But the One did. For, despite the fact that she spent the vast majority of her time choosing not to take feelings into consideration—both those of others and her own—her incisiveness extended into the shadows and fine gradations of the emotional realm as well. And, in keeping with the occasional lapse into tenderness that she had been permitting herself from time to time in the twilight of her life, she touched Ann’s face, removing a mitten before doing so. The cheeks of the young woman whom she considered akin to a daughter glowed bright red.
“Ann. It’s not a competition. You know that.”
Ann’s cheeks burned even brighter. The One continued, still gazing into Ann’s eye. “I trust you most.”
Ann squirmed as if she were being forced to stare into the sun. Abruptly she rose to her feet and picked up the bundle the One had given her. “Safe transfer,” she said briskly. “I’ll put this in my room.”
“This is your room,” said the One. “Murgatroyd’s taking Mildred’s and you’re taking mine.”
Ann placed the bundle back on the window seat. “Then I’m going downstairs.”
“While you’re down there, find Mildred and tell her I’m ready to leave.”
Ann nodded, and before the One could say another word, the door slammed shut and Ann was gone.
Immediately upon Ann’s exit, the One did a most uncharacteristic thing—she rested. She did so against her will; if asked, she would have preferred to remain standing. Her body, however, ignored her wishes and collapsed into the enormous nest of pillows and blankets and furs in the far corner of the room. Her muscles slackened, her eyelids drooped, her breathing slowed, and if she had been looking into a mirror, she would have seen her face grow terribly, terribly old. In lieu of a mirror, there was the fireplace, and she mustered up the energy
to adjust her neck so she could stare into the flickering, darting flames. She heard music wafting faintly in through the window from outside—a chorus of cellos, or at least, instruments very cello-like. But as she had never found music particularly interesting—to her, human artifice could never hold a candle to the wonders of nature—she filtered the sonorous cadences from her ears as effortlessly as another might the monotonous trill of a zanzara toad colony, or the low hum of a power generator, and instead, she dwelt on the past. More specifically, on Yusuf.
He’d been dead for eighteen years now. And though she had once considered him not just her cofounder and colleague, but her closest friend, she rarely spared a tender thought for him anymore. After that argument they’d had—the disagreement that had led to Yusuf disappearing for more than a year—their relationship was never the same. And a dozen years later, when Yusuf chose to officially resign from the Quest and leave the grand and glorious enterprise they had started together in their starry-eyed youth, the blow it dealt her was heavy, even though she’d acted as if it were nothing at all.
Then, when she discovered upon his death that it was he who had been responsible for all that ice cream—the delicious, mysterious ice cream that would appear at random without rhyme or reason in the settlements, on doorsteps, in fields, by the side of a road, in such a way and at such a time that the tubs would be discovered before they went soupy and warm—when she had discovered that! Oh, it had shattered her! Wasn’t it enough that he’d abandoned everything they’d built together, everything they’d worked so hard for? Had he had to live a double life too? How could someone she had known so well and cared for so much have become so foreign to her, so unknown?
No one knew how severely she had been affected by Yusuf’s departure and the postmortem discovery of his secret ice cream–making life, but she was keenly aware that these two events together had lodged a shard in her heart. More than a shard. A kernel—a living, breathing, bladed seed. And to prevent it from germinating and ripping her heart to shreds, she had starved it. The memories that might have watered it, she wrung dry of all tenderness and nostalgia, and the very fact of his erstwhile existence, she locked away in the deepest recesses of her cavernous brain.